Only ten years ago, most companies performed background checks in an informal, inconsistent, slow, costly, manual and paper-intensive process. Today, employment screening has evolved to be a formalized, consistent and highly automated process conducted by most large organizations. Creating new challenges for employers, business demands driving screening programs have become increasingly complex, fueling the need for management solutions to help HR professionals better cope with new concerns. Some of the more recent challenges impacting background screening include: globalization and international screening; increasing regulatory requirements; immigration reform; collaboration needs; and screening the extended workforce. Throw in the need to do more with less while reducing hiring cycle time, and it’s clear that making employment screening fast and easy would serve any organization well.

Only ten years ago, most companies performed background checks in an informal, inconsistent, slow, costly, manual and paper-intensive process. Today, employment screening has evolved to be a formalized, consistent and highly automated process conducted by most large organizations.

Creating new challenges for employers, business demands driving screening programs have become increasingly complex, fueling the need for management solutions to help HR professionals better cope with new concerns.

Some of the more recent challenges impacting background screening include: globalization and international screening; increasing regulatory requirements; immigration reform; collaboration needs; and screening the extended workforce. Throw in the need to do more with less while reducing hiring cycle time, and it’s clear that making employment screening fast and easy would serve any organization well.

Trends Point to Integration
As the requirements have intensified, automation and integration technologies have evolved. Screening management solutions can be integrated into applicant tracking systems (ATS), resulting in reduced workload, faster time-to-hire, a lesser likelihood of errors, and improved accuracy, consistency, process efficiency and management.

In fact, according to the 2008 HireRight Background Screening Benchmarking Report, more than half of the roughly 300 organizations surveyed have integrated or plan to integrate their background screening solution with their ATS. 

However, not all integrated screening solutions are created equal and some may not address the complete needs of your organization.

With the intent to meet employer needs and improve process efficiency, different flavors of integrated screening solutions have emerged. Some are one-off solutions designed just for you, and others have been developed as a product to deliver a repeatable, scalable and positive user experience for many customers.

Since integrations generally don’t come with a label on the box, here are some tips for organizations evaluating the prospect of integrating screening with their ATS or other HR system.

1) Examine the Functionality
Look for an integrated solution that provides access to all the features and capabilities you’d find in a stand-alone background screening solution – things like seamless workflow, applicant self-service, real-time status updates, analytical reports and summary management dashboards for visibility over the entire screening program.

Approach the decision on an integrated solution the same way you would any other business solution – by starting with your needs and then identifying viable solutions that meet them.

2) Confirm Adequate Security Controls
With the one-off nature of some integrations, standard precautions that you may expect to be included in the solution can sometimes be overlooked. Given the nature of screening information and the criticality of protecting candidate privacy, sound data protection measures for storage, viewing and transmission within the integration should be at the top of your list.

Getting specifics on the technologies and security protocols used in the integration and supporting integration platform will help you understand the diligence applied by the screening provider.

3) Understand Current and Future Support Commitments
One of the biggest areas of concern you may find when looking deeper at a potential integration is the level of support. Not just technical support, but broader support from the two solutions providers to ensure that someone is available and accountable if something goes wrong.

Thinking long-term, you’ll want an understanding of how the integration will be supported through future upgrades of the related systems. To address this issue, some pre-integrated solutions – solutions co-developed, tested and supported by the screening provider and the ATS provider – are available today and should be considered as an option for anyone interested in leveraging their ATS for employment screening.

4) Ensure Required Flexibility
To save time and money, some integrations are built with the lowest common denominator in mind – they pass only limited information from one system to another. They’re generally light in the features provided and the related configuration options offered.

When evaluating integration options, be sure to consider your requirements of today, as well as future needs. Understand the integration’s ability to keep up with business demands. As your screening program evolves or policies change, what other features might you want to add and what will necessary changes to the integration cost? Also, will you want to integrate I-9 or other screening services in the future?

As the trend in streamlining hiring processes continues, integration between employment screening and hiring systems will continue to be a productivity strategy near the top of the list for employers. In evaluating available integration options, you’ll be best served to confirm that the solution of choice meets your requirements from a functionality, security, support and flexibility standpoint – today and in the future.

I was poking around the FBI’s website the other day and ran into a 2010 report about NICS (the National Instant Criminal Background Check System) checks, which is the background check that happens when you buy a gun from a gun shop and causes those 10 frustrating minutes after you’ve plunked down your dollars but before you can have the gun. Turns out they’ve done that exact same thing over 124 million times (124,427,448 as of December 31, 2010 to be exact) and have some interesting statistics to share.

I was poking around the FBI’s website the other day and ran into a 2010 report about NICS (the National Instant Criminal Background Check System) checks, which is the background check that happens when you buy a gun from a gun shop and causes those 10 frustrating minutes after you’ve plunked down your dollars but before you can have the gun. Turns out they’ve done that exact same thing over 124 million times (124,427,448 as of December 31, 2010 to be exact) and have some interesting statistics to share.

One of the more interesting statistics the FBI shares right off the bat are the top five days and weeks in terms of volume of checks. Here’s the top five days (2011 excluded):

A couple things immediately stand out from this table. First is the day that keeps popping up: Black Friday. The number 1 day for NICS checks (and #3, and #5…) is the day after Thanksgiving, the national holiday celebrating American capitalism. Conspicuously absent from the “top” days and even weeks tables are the days following Election Day 2008, when Barack Obama was elected. Another anomaly of note is that three consecutive days, October 1st through 3rd,  2010, all appear in the top 10 days but I can’t figure out why. Tim, on the other hand, has a pretty good theory:

As for October 2008 – Reading through this might give you some idea of why – the housing markets, uncertainty and the odds for Obama winning increasing after McCain suspended his campaign… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_2008

Of the 124+ million NICS checks that dealers have done over the years just under 821,000 have been denied. That means every time someone buys a gun there’s a 0.6% chance they’ll be denied. Don’t fall for the ludic fallacy on that one, I just thought it was a nifty statistic. Thankfully, the FBI has broken out their denials into another easy to understand table.

From the statistics it seems like the majority of the denials come from convicted criminals and perpetrators of domestic violence. Among the people who probably shouldn’t own firearms those categories would rank the highest in my book, so that’s good.

In order to make the NICS system truly instant the FBI uses a computerized database of names and identifying features of “bad guys.” When your dealer calls the NICS operators, they check the information you gave the dealer against that database. If there’s a match they send it off to an investigator for further digital detective work, but if there’s no match then they give the dealer the green light. So what kinds of records are in this database?

Interesting. 61% of the NICS denials come from only 6.75% of the records, with 68.5% of the records pertaining to illegal immigrants (who account for a little over 1% of denials).

Hiring highly qualified people is crucial to every company, and Background Screening and Investigations is an essential guide to succeeding in a turbulent business environment. A crucial part of any hiring process should be employment background screening, pre- and post-hire, which gives hiring personnel a glimpse into a person's past behavior patterns, propensities, and likely future behavior.

Background Screening and Investigations describes all aspects of the employment background screening processes - its history and evolution, the imperative for implementing a screening process, and the creation of a comprehensive policy. Nixon and Kerr show how security and human resources professionals can work together to negotiate legal hurdles and make their background screening process successful.

* Where do HR and security perspectives differ on hot topics like hiring convicted felons, data protection, and sexual predators?
* What does state law allow when screening job candidates?
* How should companies deal with emerging issues like international background investigations and continuous (Infinity) screening of current employees?

Everyone's guide to protecting yourself from dishonest people, by the nation's most respected reference-check expert

Unqualified hires, abusive nannies, delinquent renters, dishonest contractors . . . in today's dog-eat-dog world, what readers don't know about the people they depend on can definitely hurt them. Written in plain, jargon-free English by Monster.com's reference expert, Reference Checking for Everyone tells managers, business owners, HR professionals, landlords, administrators, and even parents how to find everything they need to know about anyone.

Paul Barada covers every aspect of personal intel-gathering with a wealth of easy-to-access information on:

• Choosing the best employees, tenants, nannies, service providers, and other key people
• Navigating the complex legal issues--includes a waiver form and lists of questions that can and cannot be asked legally
• Getting information quickly to avoid slowing down the hiring or rental process
• Exposing liars and dealing with dishonest candidates, renters, and others
• Obtaining in-depth history, even when confronted with "no comment" policies